Lost Sense of Freedom

The following article is written by Bradford C. Archer, who is not a professional writer.? He is a Group Manager who works in Construction Management.? We are finding many people like Brad who have become so concerned by what they see going on in our country that they love so much, that they have been moved to do things they’ve never done before… like write articles for websites like this one.

Lost Sense of Freedom
Bradford C. Archer

Our founding fathers created something that had never been tried in the history of mankind. They created the framework for a nation where the power lay with the people and not the rulers. Their vision was a place where ALL men were created equal by their creator, and they acknowledged that all men were endowed with certain inalienable rights- life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

These ideals were so embraced by these founding fathers that they were willing to sacrifice everything- their fortunes, their families, and their lives. Definitely serious business. In their brilliance, they laid the groundwork for a self-sustaining, self-determining government body. They developed the greatest document in the history of mankind, the Constitution.? It is the intent of the Constitution to prevent the government from becoming burdensome to the general public by keeping the power with the people. In other words, the government should fear the people, the people shouldn’t fear the government.

Okay. Let‘s fast-forward 200+ years and see where we are. We can look and see past mistakes by the founding fathers and their successors. Slavery is the obvious mistake.? In true American-governmental procrastination, we failed to deal with a critical issue and passed this along to later generations, and we all know what happened when we tried to settle that issue.

The more I read about the freedoms that the founding fathers had given me, I begin to realize how many freedoms I have either lost or have never been bestowed upon my generation. I see more and more of these freedoms eroding away. I agreed to write a paper regarding these lost freedoms, but as I was formatting this paper, I realized that there are so many examples, it is hard to decide where to begin.

Stanislav Mishin, writing for Pravda stated that American capitalism has gone with a whimper. Mishin cites that first we have dumbed down the population through politicized and substandard education system based on pop culture, rather than the classics?. Then he says we have destroyed our faith in God and that churches are?for the most part, Sunday circuses and their televangelists and top protestant mega-preachers were more than happy to sell out their souls and flocks to be on the winning side of one pseudo-marxist politician or another?. Finally, Mishin says the final act in this collapse is the election of Barack Obama. Mishin states “His spending and money printing has been a record setting, not just in America’s short history, but in the world.? If he keeps this up for more than another year, and there is no sign that it will not, America at best will resemble the Weimar Republic and at worst, Zimbabwe”.

I don’t know what it is about this article that disturbs me the most. Is it because Mishin is a Russian commentator and columnist and what happens here is none of his business (akin to interfering in a domestic dispute), or is it because he is right and after all, has seen Marxism up close and personal.

Like many others, I get up in the morning, go to work and pay my bills. I fully enjoy what I do, and I get paid modestly, not great but enough to meet my needs. But a funny thing happens in this process.? I have the invisible hand of government with their hands out and they get paid for my work before I do. Now I agree with many that I should be paying taxes, it is after all the way to fund the government, but I am becoming a bit irate when I watch my tax dollars paying for things we should never have to pay for.

The State of California just had a tax referendum wherein the taxpayers refused several tax increases. In the typical drumming, the members of California’s government began mentioning basic necessities that may need to be cut or rolled back. Instead, the California government ought to reduce costs by refusing to pay benefits to illegal immigrants. 21 million illegals that qualify for state-funded healthcare, unemployment, food stamps, and other costly social safety nets intended for citizens only deplete the state coiffures and no one has the intestinal fortitude to do the right thing.

Now the State of California has no bearing on me in the state of Virginia, right? After all, it is California‘s problem, isn‘t it? They can‘t maintain their budgets, so I should worry here in Virginia? Nah, relax man. That is California‘s problem. But wait. New York is having the same problem? So are a few other states? And what is that bit on the news? Bail-outs for the states? Because they haven‘t done right by their citizens, my tax dollars have to bail-out California or New York? But that is not where I want my tax dollars to go. Do I have a choice?

The banks needed bailing out. GM and Chrysler needed bailing out. The insurance companies. We pass out money like it‘s candy, and expect our Treasury Bonds to be bought up by other countries. I watch as we sell off our sovereignty to foreign powers. We rack up debt like Paris Hilton with a new credit card. We mortgage our children‘s futures for our recklessness of today. At the helm, we have a President and a Congress who don‘t understand the basics of bottom-line decision-making. Instead, let us hand out dollars like candy so the people will vote for us again.

We, the American tax payer now own a 60% stake in GM. I watch as a 31 year-old with no business training or experience is given the helm. Wait. If I and others like me own 60%, then issue me my stake in stock certificates and let me vote on who should be at the helm. I doubt seriously I would vote for a 31 year-old. Give me a Lee Iococca or Mitt Romney, or a Jack Welsh. My tax money went to this endeavor, my government racked up more debt in doing so, they have taken control of the company, and I have no say in this. What is wrong with this picture?

I have been asked to write about the growing loss of freedoms But I cannot do this in one sitting.? There are too many ways we, as Americans, lose our freedoms.? Don’t get me wrong, they haven’t been lost in one huge power grab.? Instead we have lost our basic freedoms through a steady erosion process.? Imagine a house on a hillside: the soil around the foundation gradually erodes over the years.? Soon, there isn‘t enough soil to stabilize the foundation, ultimately leading to the collapse of the house.? This is the same gradual, imperceptible way we are losing our freedoms. These are the things Mishin alluded to in his treatise in Pravda.

I have decided to spend the next few months posting the various ways we continue to lose our freedoms. Think about all of the many ways we no longer have a free choice.? Taxes, various forms of legislation, the intrusion of the federal government with either states‘ rights or its interference with private businesses, the education system, the banking system, and so on, every governmental interference in a place where it has no Constitutional right to be works to erode our freedoms.? After enough time, we can no longer recognize the house we originally started with.

Instead of trying to write about these losses of freedom in one sitting, I am going to write a series. We are headed down the path where each of us will have to bow before the altar of government, waiting for our turn to feed at the trough. This is not what the founding fathers envisioned, and through apathy, ignorance and swindle, we have lost what was once given us.? It is time to recognize this and take it back.

Tags: american exceptionalism